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Cool, hunh?  Love it.       即便我每天学汉字, 我还不会看报或书 我应该很长时间学习汉语......

Got grades done, can turn them in and be finished for this term. I've realized that I was way too disorganized this term. Good luck that my habits of order and filing pulled me thru. That will change though. Got a project going live on the weekend, and I gotta get ready for that!  The change of pace should be good for me. I can change hats and try a different tack.  As the bard said: All the world's a stage, and the people merely players on it. I'll change costume and roles.

Watching the 4 Musketeers - the sequel to the 3 Musketeers - It's merely the 2nd part of Dumas' story, but to my mind is the best film adaptation of that story ever made.  The scenes between Oliver Reed as Athos and Faye Dunaway as Milady are just great. One time lovers who are now deadly enemies - but who both remember the former time.
George MacDonald Fraser wrote the screenplay, and he did a superb job. As did the cast- Reed, Michael Caine as D'Artagnan, Richard Chamberlain as Aramis, Raquel Welsh as Constance, and Charlton Heston as the ominous Richelieu. To me it's one of the best casting jobs ever. Made a lively little tale into a rousing story of love and intrigue.  

I'm having a dram of Laphroaig in celebration. A friend brought me a bottle, and I save it for special occaisions. No doubt 'twill lift my spirits a bit. It will help in my appreciation of the musketeers - I love the language they use, and a bit of the malt will enhance that.

I've news that a set of 'Firefly' is waiting, and I'm anticipating. I really liked 'Serenity', the Tutor and I sat here trying to figure out just what the Putonghua phrases meant. :)    She couldn't understand them much better than I did. In fact, I was the one to point out that they were Putonghua!  
Ah well, time to go.  Gotta go in tomorrow and figure out what's up with the project. That will be and exercise in using Putonghua!
Adieu.

Made it to another year!!!  
This one should be interesting.....

Saw the movie 'Serenity' recently.  Interesting movie, fun story and plenty of action. I was watching with tutor and one of the characters said something I couldn't understand... backed up, listened again - dong le ma?  Hey, that's Chinese!!!  Badly pronounced chinese, but there it was.  We listened carefully throughout the movie, catching and trying to understand the phrases thrown out.
我想昧耳，昧心，变石头 screamed a girl later on.  One character says "大家坐下“　.  
Really fun, that an American movie would have American actors speaking Mandarin.  
The story to the movie is that, far in the future, the US and China have colonized planets far from Earth.  The people there have elements of both cultures, and use both English and Chinese in daily life. The movie starts with a look at the ship's name :
Serenity, with the characters 宁静 behind it. Shiny, as they'd say:  
One of the most fun movies I've seen lately and I've seen it a lot cause I re-ran parts to catch the chinese:)

Oh, well. Happy New Year everyone.  Let's see how this one goes!